


Almost

by lustfulmango



Series: Quiet Moments [1]
Category: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Armchair Therapy, Character Lore, Gen, I love my boy, Writing Prompt, but please read it, hahaha i hurt writing this, not romantic - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:13:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23060746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lustfulmango/pseuds/lustfulmango
Summary: In a recorded session with Harry "Six" Pandey, operator Vigil finally cracks his impenetrable wall for a moment.
Series: Quiet Moments [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1721536
Kudos: 21





	Almost

**Author's Note:**

> hAhA i love my boy vigil :((((

“She almost made it.”

Harry Pandey stopped his slow pacing at those words and turned to face the man in the chair. The recording device was running on the wooden desk. Rain was falling around the glass walls rhythmically, tapping insistently as if God was a child rattling the creatures in his tank. 

Harry let the hoodie string fall from his fingers and stroked his beard, one arm held behind his back introspectively as he waited for more—just in case Chul Kyung Hwa deigned to say anything else. But the Korean man stayed quiet as he continued to stare at folded hands between his knees.

He was aware of Harry looking at him, observing every single action or inaction that was taken, damn his nature. Every session they had had ended in so little words spoken, if spoken at all. All Chul Kyung allowed were tight-lipped one word answers to every question, unable to crack open the walls he put up himself. He wondered what Harry saw: a man in his mid-thirties who never leaned back in the plush office chair, every sense feeling out the situation even when the premises were supposed to be safe. Quiet—no, silent. He could feel Harry’s question bubbling out of him before it burst from his will into his vocal cords. _Who?_

“My mother,” Chul Kyung said. He cleared his throat, not quite used to this. “She almost made it.” Rain fell between each word, then in the emptiness that followed.

It was raining that night too. Maybe. Maybe it was just the white noise that wouldn’t stop sounding in that memory. They were a family of four. Four was a good number, a safe number. Symmetrical. Two parents and a pair of brothers.

But “four” was death. Their days were numbered the moment they became four—with Chul Kyung’s birth.

He couldn’t remember any of their faces, or their names—the father he called “dad”, the brother he called “hyung”, or the mother he once called “mom”. Instead, he remembered the sticky heat in the jungle, hair matted to his face with dirt and sweat. He’d lost a shoe sometime between the safe house and the jungle crossing, not quite sure when and where it was. The soil underneath was cold and sucked at his skin, raising the goosebumps on his arms despite the tropical warmth. Every breath took some effort, as if the air was thicker and more difficult to inhale.

Somehow Chul Kyung knew they were a man down but couldn’t remember when. Now three and one child less, the chances of survival had improved. No one said it, but his brother’s absence was felt guiltily. They’d gotten so far—the border was just past the jungle. How long until they reached it? A day? Two? It was impossible to tell in retrospect.

She’d gotten sick, his mother. At first it was fatigue, then a fever. For the first few days she moved as well as she could, trying to keep up with his father who always looked forward. Chul Kyung knew his father tried, taking as many short rests as he could afford, helping suppress her coughs with the fabric of his clothing so anyone unwanted couldn’t hear.

Finally, when her already sluggish movements were made more feeble by the fever ravaging her body, Chul Kyung’s father took his thin face in his hands. The darkness of night blackened his father’s face—maybe it was the memory loss—but he remembered the rough callouses and the moisture of sweat against his cheek, the cracks and cuts under his own hands as he gripped the thin wrists.

“We are going ahead,” he was told. Somehow, his father’s voice sounded like his own, deep and resonant with urgency. “Mom can’t come with us. She’s too sick.” Why couldn’t he remember his father’s face? He remembered the breath on his own cheeks, the stench of sickness and body odor masking everything else in such close proximity. Looking into his father’s face, all he saw was the damned black hole of his memory. “Go, say goodbye to her quietly. Listen well, okay? We don’t have a lot of time.” The rain was starting again, after such a lull. It was their best chance to move.

Chul Kyung remembered crawling the few steps it took to his mother, who leaned against the rough bark of a tree. It was too dark to tell her complexion. He remember she could barely keep her eyes open. Her face was another hole in his memory, but not her touch—just like his father’s. Hands that should have been soft, fingers that were too skeletal to function, caressed his cheek where two seconds ago were scratched by his father’s. Chul Kyung had clutched her fingers in his tightly, unwilling to let go. She brought his face close to her, her kiss cold and trembling, and then she spoke into his ear.

The sound of rainfall had drowned out every word she said. As soon as his father pulled him away, the white noise had cleared up, but her words were lost.

“Don’t cry,” he was told after a while. How did his father know? His back was to him as they trekked for god knows how long. “They’ll catch us if they hear you.”  
When the sun shone again, they’d crossed the border to South Korea. Or something like that. It was hard to remember what exactly happened between that time and the next. Maybe he looked back after entering South Korea, his father clinging to him in relief as people pooled around the two with supplies and first aid kits, wondering where she was. Maybe they wouldn’t have had to say goodbye—what had she even said in the precious last seconds they had together? Maybe a few more steps and she would be here too.

She almost made it.

_Almost._ Harry could see his agent’s entire struggle in the one word. Chul Kyung never wasted his words, and the fact that he’d said this much—just two sentences, really—was improvement. Even though Craig “Blackbeard” Jenson had filled him in on Chul Kyung, Harry wanted to hear the demons come from the man himself. He watched Chul Kyung, still leaning forward in the chair, waiting for something to happen, but there was nothing else. Harry wanted to push but knew these battles were rarely won.

Finally, Chul Kyung stood from the chair. He gave the slightest nod to Harry, who nodded back at him, and headed for the door. Harry picked up the recording device on his desk and shut it off, marveling at how much they’d gotten done with two sentences and half an hour. He looked at Vigil’s retreating back and opened his mouth to say something—just as the rain picked up into a torrential downpour. The words were spoken so softly at that moment that Vigil almost missed it amid the noise.

“I’ll see you again,” Harry said, smiling warmly.

**Author's Note:**

> Today's writing prompt was: Write a story that captures the sadness of the word "almost". I didn't think I'd do fanfiction for this, but here I am, writing about one of my favorite operators in R6: Siege. He's an edgelord and angsty af but damn it if he isn't good writing fodder. Maybe one day I will have him achieve happiness. :(


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